Bing: 9 SEO related things that you should know

Bing’s Duane Forrester has published a list of 12 SEO related things that you should know if you want to get high rankings on Bing. Although this list is for Bing, it is very likely that Google has similar requirements.

1. Title tags are still very important

The titles tags of your web pages should be relevant to the content on the page. Duane Forrester says that you should not skip them because Bing will automatically create web page titles that might not be ideal if you omit them.

Web page titles have a major influence on the position of your pages in the search results. They are also the most prominent text on the search result page. Invest some time to create powerful web page titles.

2. Meta Descriptions are still useful

Although the meta description tag does not influence the position of your web pages in the search results, a relevant meta description tag with a clear call to action can make the difference on the search result page. Use descriptive meta description tags that get the searchers attention.

3. Backlinks are very important

When it comes to backlinks, the same old rules apply: try to get good backlinks from related websites. Avoid spam because Bing “can still spot shortcuts a mile away.”

4. Check links to other websites

Duane Forrester says that Bing judges your website by who you link to, so choose who you link to carefully.

5. Use clean URLs

The links on your website should be clean and crawlable. Do not hide links in JavaScript or Flash code. Nothing new here.

5. Avoid duplicate content

You should avoid duplicate content on your website. If possible, use a 301 redirect. Duane Forrester says that you shouldn’t “sweat the value passed through the redirect.”

6. 301 redirects are better than 302 redirects

According to Bing, most programmers implement 302 redirects although they actually want a 301 redirect. If Bingbot sees five 302 redirects in a row, they assume that you meant a 301 and transfer value as if it’s actually a 301 redirect.

7. Social media influences your web page rankings

Duane Forrester is very clear about it: “[Social media is] still as important as you’ve heard, and to clarify, that means what happens socially can impact your rankings.

Just having more Likes or Retweets won’t boost rankings, but they can help add to the overall picture of value we seek to understand.

8. HTML5 and mobile are future trends

Although HTML5 adoption is low, responsive design is getting more important. Responsive web design is a web design approach aimed at crafting sites to provide an optimal viewing experience—easy reading and navigation with a minimum of resizing, panning, and scrolling—across a wide range of devices

9. You should check your robots.txt file

Bing follows the robots.txt protocol. Make sure that your robots.txt file doesn’t inadvertently tell Bing to crawl something you want left alone. Use the robots.txt creator in the website audit tool in SEOprofiler to create a proper robots.txt file for your website.

Getting your website on search engines is easy if you do the right things. Use the website audit tool in SEOprofiler to make sure that search engines can index your web pages correctly.